


runs a river that will never find home

by crownedcarl



Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: Angst and Porn, Dysfunctional Relationships, Emotional Hurt, Explicit Sexual Content, First Time, Love/Hate, M/M, One Shot, Pining, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-13
Updated: 2020-11-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:15:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27545197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crownedcarl/pseuds/crownedcarl
Summary: He could hurt Nathan. He could take care of Nathan, too, if Nathan decided to let him.
Relationships: Duke Crocker/Nathan Wuornos
Comments: 9
Kudos: 17





	runs a river that will never find home

**Author's Note:**

> I found this buried in Google Docs, dated 28/09/2019 - the first Haven fic I ever wrote, probably, even though it sat unfinished for a while. This takes place pre-series, barely. Title from Fireworks by Mitski.

Duke’s spent twenty odd years trying to fill a void he can’t put a name to. Thursday evening, with the sunset long gone, he tries to fill another, plying Nathan with drinks that are half-heartedly refused, the waves crashing accusingly against the shore.

The boat rocks merrily, like it’s trying to lull them to sleep, but Duke’s wide-eyed and a couple miles past desperate already, letting Nathan steer the conversation like a sailor without a compass, stranded in the middle of the black sea. Duke’s already laughed himself hoarse over the bruise Nathan left on his cheek. Somehow, this feels a lot like a chapter closing without a satisfying conclusion.

Nathan is sitting on the deck, his legs crossed neatly at the ankle while his hand, bruised purple across the knuckles, brings a bottle of beer to his mouth, the neck of it sweating like a whore in church.

Duke has his legs stretched out in front of him, a gentle breeze tossing his bangs into his face to tickle at his nose, one hand braced behind him as he takes a slow pull from his own Heineken, quietly content in the only way he knows how to be. He’s got a cold beer. He’s got Nathan for company. These days, he could be asking for a whole lot less.

After the inevitable fights, he almost enjoys Nathan’s company. The coming down from the adrenaline rush makes his shoulders loose and his sprawl relaxed, long limbs not quite touching Nathan and not quite knowing if he wants them to. It’s never worth the effort of finding out one way or another. Nathan’s voice is tired, trailing off, and he never does let Duke find out the punchline to his rambling joke.

Instead, Nathan quiets. He peers at Duke like he’s expecting him to pick up the slack. When Duke won’t, Nathan groans, flexing his hand, staring at his fingers with a questioning light in his eyes. “Anyway,” he says, swallowing thickly, “You know what?”

“What?

“I had a dream about you,” Nathan murmurs, his voice thin and drowsy as he blinks slowly, watching Duke turn his head to meet his eyes. “Last week.”

“Did you, now? A naughty dream, I assume,” Duke grins, taking it in stride. Nathan never feels himself edging past tipsy these days, things being the way that they are, but his brain stops being able to catch up to his mouth and little truths, unimportant and random, end up spilling free. Duke wonders if he should appreciate that. “I’m flattered.”

“No,” Nathan denies, closing his eyes and clumsily rearranging himself on his back with his arms splayed out, barely avoiding knocking over his bottle, and Duke wonders if there’s a metaphor in there that he’s not seeing. “Not that. It was weirder.”

Duke hums softly in response. Nathan falls silent, which means Duke is doing something wrong, his eyes tracing the long, flat plane of belly and chest through Nathan’s thin shirt. It’s chilly tonight, but Nathan won’t feel it, the same way he doesn’t feel Duke settling comfortably astride his hips, spilling his drink into the hollow of Nathan’s vulnerable throat.

He’s never been good at thinking of consequences.

“Then tell me. What happened in your dream?” Duke asks, watching as Nathan startles, blinking his eyes open and finding Duke straddling him as if that’s something the two of them _do_.

Nathan looks confused and irritated and very tired. Duke looks evenly at Nathan and leans down, closing his mouth around Nathan’s skin, lapping at the curve of his throat, tasting bitter sweat and lukewarm beer.

For a moment, Nathan makes a noise and shoves clumsily at his chest, but his arms seem to give out before he can push with force, his head tipping back against the deck and thumping noisily against the hull. It echoes briefly, a hollow sound of metal grating against wood.

Duke pulls back again, watching Nathan’s eyelashes twitching against his cheeks while he chews his lower lip, deep in thought, or maybe he’s just drunk.

“Remember high school?” Nathan laughs, his eyes red-rimmed. “We were at a party. Diane - Diane kissed you, ‘cause you...I think you gave her a shot, maybe. She kissed you and Bobby walked in and decked you. You stayed on the floor all night.”

“Nathan,” Duke sighs, pursing his lips, bracing his hands on the deck, “That was you, you moron. You kissed me.”

Nobody punched anyone, but Nathan didn’t speak to Duke for days. He furrows his brow, now, glaring at Duke, before huffing out a quiet “I’m sorry,” and Duke heats up under the weight of that apology, because it figures.

Of course Nathan would be sorry about the kiss, but not everything else.

“Well,” Duke allows, “You kissed me, you’re sorry. I left, I'm sorry. Bigger fish, you know?”

Nathan gives him a look, one of those anxious ones, rabbit in the headlights. “Sure,” he murmurs, because Nathan never understood that it was never Haven Duke was trying to leave behind. It was less about running, too, than it was about trying to find something tangible to hold on to.

He thinks he gets it. The end result was the same. Duke left. Nathan’s never going to forgive him for that, because the leaving happened right after he delivered Nathan back home, short one of his senses, and Duke can already feel the familiar guilt clawing at his throat.

“What were you looking for?” Nathan asks.

“I don’t know,” Duke admits, taking the long way around the answer, his smile feeling all off. “Purpose? God? I’ll let you know when I find it, Nate, how about that?”

Despite the laughter that boils over in Duke’s mouth, there’s a half-truth to his evasive answers, because Duke’s been itching to shake hands with god since the moment his life went to hell, miles out at sea, watching Nathan’s face in the exact moment that he started hating Duke.

It’s not that different from the way Nathan’s looking at him now. “What?” he asks, muscles in his neck tensing, head tilted back, rolling against the deck. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Duke answers by leaning down, kissing Nathan, wondering why Nathan lets him. In the first few seconds, Nathan is as still as a corpse. Before Duke can start regretting it, though, Nathan relaxes like it’s taking all his self-control to manage it, but he exhales ragged and loud against Duke’s mouth and whispers “Don’t stop now, Duke.”

Nathan can’t feel it at all. It has to mean something significant, the fact that he lets Duke kiss him with his eyes closed, a knife-sharp bolt of pleasure stabbing Duke in the gut at the realisation of how deeply Nathan’s trust goes, or how little he cares if Duke hurts him, because Duke could.

Duke could break Nathan’s wrist. He could bite Nathan’s lip bloody, crush his ribs under his weight and Nathan would be none the wiser until long after the deed was done, but Duke chooses to lean down and savor the slow, too-harsh press of Nathan’s mouth against his own.

He could hurt Nathan. He could take care of Nathan, too, if Nathan decided to let him.

It’s raining - the kind of misty rain that Duke likes best, plastering his shirt slowly to his back while Nathan shivers beneath him. Nathan’s a brand new territory; Duke doesn’t know where to start, hands flexing against Nathan’s shoulders. He dips his head, tastes Nathan’s throat again.

“I want,” Nathan says, his chin nudging the top of Duke’s head, his hands warm weights on Duke’s hips. “I want you to fuck me. I want to see it.”

Duke blinks, mouth half-open with shock. “Easy,” he chokes out, “You don’t think you’re getting ahead of yourself, just a little?” but Nathan sears him with a sharp look and Duke closes his mouth abruptly, knowing exactly what Nathan isn’t saying. _You owe me._

Nathan’s face is flushed, his eyebrows drawn together in concentration, gaze flitting between Duke’s slack-jawed expression and the place where his hips rest against Nathan’s own, because of course the visual is all Nathan’s really getting out of this. “Would you?”

The way he asks it is challenging and defiant and, beneath the bluster, quietly embarrassed. For a second, it makes something whip-crack sharp ache through Duke, because it’s the exact same way Nathan had asked Duke for his first joint, years ago. It’s the Nathan Duke hasn’t known in years.

“Sure,” Duke throws out there, knowing there’s no point in pretending otherwise, “But, Nate. It won’t do anything for you.”

“Don’t tell me that,” Nathan snaps. “I’ll be able to see it. I just - I want to know, Duke.”

It lights Duke up inside, knowing that Nathan won’t feel it, that he won’t enjoy it the way Duke will, but that he wants it, still, badly enough to push, badly enough to squirm against Duke in a pretense of feeling, of wanting Duke’s skin against his own.

It can’t be all an act, even if Nathan can barely meet Duke’s eyes, like he’s just looking for a cheap thrill and Duke happened to be in the right place at the right time. He still appreciates it, though, the fact that Nathan’s trying so hard to convince Duke that this isn’t a bad idea, as if he isn’t already sold, brushing the hair back from his eyes to get a proper look at Nathan’s face.

Nathan’s face is rain-damp, hot where Duke kisses the corner of his mouth. “Let me do it properly,” Duke insists, watching carefully until Nathan nods, then ends up staring at him, drinking him in. “I could,” Duke finally agrees, an entire minute after Nathan asked him to. “I could do that, yeah. Have you ever done this before, though? Like this?”

He means _since you became numb. Since, since, since._

“Never.”

“That’s what I thought.”

He grins when Nathan glares, waving a hand loosely. “You never seemed the type,” and Nathan keeps glaring, despite the fact that he’s blinking rain out of his eyes, lashes damp with it, but at least he’s looking at Duke. At least he’s giving Duke that much.

Nathan makes him feel invisible, sometimes, has ever since they were kids. Maybe that’s why Duke is so desperate for his attention, going the extra mile to get Nathan to look at him, sometimes with disdain, sometimes thinly veiled amusement.

Duke doesn’t mind either way, but privately, he thinks that Nathan could stand to smile a little more, the way he’s cracking under Duke’s waggling eyebrows, now, tiny smile settling in the curve of Nathan’s lips.

It’s a bad idea. Duke knows that there’s no way he’s walking out of this winning, but Nathan asked, and Duke couldn’t face himself if he said no, no matter how reckless this ends up being.

Nathan makes him a little stupid, sometimes, the way he’s making Duke feel tangled up on Nathan’s hips, his hands trembling where his fists are digging into Nathan’s shoulders.

“Okay,” Duke exhales, praying to someone, anyone, that he’s not destroying his last shot at fixing things, “Okay, tough guy. We should...probably get downstairs,” and it’s only when Duke says it out loud that he realizes how nerve-wracking this is, how badly his stomach is tied in knots.

Downstairs they go, a two-man procession, Duke first and Nathan behind, their feet creaking on the stairs. The tension is thick enough to cut with a knife, but Duke pointedly ignores it, tossing a towel in Nathan’s face and stripping out of his own shirt, briefly elated by the way Nathan looks him up and down, like Duke’s something worth staring at.

Absurdly calm, Duke sighs “It wouldn’t hurt you to touch me, you know. Considering the main event,” and Nathan’s head tilts like a bird’s. He halves the distance between them in four shaky steps, eyes downcast.

Duke imagined their first real kiss being different. Nathan’s lips are soft and cold. His hands are clumsy on Duke’s shoulders. When Duke leads him into the bedroom, Nathan stumbles across the threshold and it coaxes a real laugh out of Duke, and Nathan scowls, and Duke kisses him right on that scowling mouth, heart pounding in his chest like he’s terrified.

In no time at all, he’s got Nathan splayed beneath him, his hands twitching on Duke’s shoulders. It’s a special kind of torture, trying to walk the line between giving Nathan what he wants and trying, with his entire heart, not to hurt him, but Nathan’s restless, moving like he’s got something to prove, impatient and anxious.

Duke sighs and Nathan pins him in place with his eyes. Blinking down at Nathan, staring at his still chest and his shifting shoulders, the place where the curve of his neck is dusted with freckles, Duke whispers “Relax,” and tries not to dwell on the fact that he could just stare at Nathan for the rest of the night and fall asleep happier than he’s been in years.

“There’s something I have to tell you,” Nathan says. His tongue is incredibly pink in his mouth, his eyes very dark, lashes twitching against high cheekbones. The worst part is that Nathan sounds like he means it, and Duke doesn’t have the heart to hear him, right now, in the middle of something this important, something this terrible.

“No,” Duke murmurs. “No, there isn’t,” and Nathan quiets down, letting Duke linger in the comfortable space where Nathan does, for once, want him.

He can deal with their bitter reality another day. He doesn’t want Nathan’s truths, right now, when Nathan can barely face them himself. Duke wants to touch Nathan’s skin, but he’s a little cold, a little tense, his chest a little too skinny beneath Duke’s palms. He thinks that he knows what Nathan wanted to say anyway, but he doesn’t ask and Nathan doesn’t insist, looking up at Duke with a strange furrow between his eyebrows. He looks scared, but determined. It’s the way he looks with a gun in his hand, single-minded and apprehensive.

God damn him, Duke thinks, for making this harder than it needs to be.

Nathan’s grip on him is a lot rougher than it really has any business being, but Duke doesn’t have the heart to tell him so. Nathan is still looking at Duke like he’s letting him down, but Duke quickly leans down and kisses him to take his mind off of it, taking Nathan’s soft exhale as a victory, savoring the sight of Nathan against the backdrop of Duke’s burgundy sheets.

“Relax,” Duke tells him, knuckles brushing the back of Nathan’s thigh. “Try, at least.”

“You know it doesn’t matter,” Nathan sighs, staring up at the ceiling. “Not to me. Can’t, anyway, you know that.”

Rolling his eyes and mouthing at Nathan’s throat, Duke groans “Think happy thoughts, Nathan. I don’t want you to lie back and think of England, but for the love of god, unwind a little. I got you.”

Nathan’s mouth twitches. “Well, would you look at that,” Duke laughs, “Haven’s finest ass does know how to smile. Imagine that.”

Suddenly, Duke finds himself rolled over, landing on his back, staring up at Nathan and Nathan’s slim legs around his hips. In the shifting light and shadows that play across Nathan’s body, Duke realizes how many scars he has, how many wounds never healed right since Nathan shut himself off to the world.

His fault, Duke thinks, poking at a scar left behind by a bullet, a wave of guilt and horrible, heavy shame rolling across him.

“Stop that,” Nathan snaps. “Don’t look at me that way.”

“Won’t,” Duke promises, shifting until he can get his legs beneath him, moving Nathan into his lap, mouthing at his throat and then higher, biting gently at the lobe of Nathan’s ear. “Besides, I don’t pity you. You’re about to get Haven’s most eligible bachelor at your mercy. Makes you pretty lucky.”

Another hard-won smile flickers across Nathan’s face and Duke frowns, wishing that Nathan could relax enough to admit that sometimes, he doesn’t hate Duke’s company, but that’s a battle for another day, even if Nathan’s been practically strong-arming Duke into getting them both here, despite the fact that Nathan started it.

He grips the backs of Nathan’s thighs, mesmerized by the way his skin molds and settles in Duke’s hands, the mood only souring a little when he realizes Nathan won’t be able to feel the bruises, tomorrow, startled when Nathan slaps his hands away, a noise getting stuck to Duke’s throat when Nathan shuffles out of his boxers, rolling his eyes when Duke’s hands instantly fly to Nathan’s hips again, his grip more bruising than before. “I’m not going anywhere,” Nathan points out, “Maybe you’re the one who should relax.”

“You should ride me,” Duke manages to blurt, breezing right past Nathan’s complaints, his voice pitched rough and low and trembling. “You could watch, take control. Enjoy it a lot more that way, I bet,” and when Nathan hesitates, Duke amends “I’m just trying to - make it good for you. So sue me.”

Nathan hums a stilted affirmative, his cheeks a little pink. He must not even know it, the way his face is flushed, or the way his cock curves against his stomach, but the thing is that Duke hasn’t really touched him, yet, which means that Nathan’s imagination is setting him down this path of heady desire that has him shifting in Duke’s lap, like he’s wordlessly begging Duke to take the reigns.

“Yeah,” Nathan eventually agrees, chewing the inside of his cheek, glancing at Duke from beneath his lashes. “I’ve never, you know. If you were wondering. At all.”

Duke blinks, then closes his eyes, a useless prayer building in his head. Of course. It isn’t enough that Nathan hasn’t been touched since he could actually feel it. Of course he’s never done this at all.

Duke can’t possibly hurt Nathan in the ways that matter, but he understands the olive branch for what it is. Nathan is offering him a get out of jail free card, letting Duke know to be gentle, if only for his own sake. “Yeah,” Duke breathes, “I figured. You’re an awful flirt. Lucky for you, I’m easy.”

Nathan has always wanted it to mean something. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it means he’s never had a one-night stand, which means Duke is either the exception to the rule, or he’s the other option: the one that means something. Tonight, he doesn’t have the energy to face that reality.

His head is spinning. Slowly, Duke works a hand around Nathan, whispering “I want to fuck you,” and he’s breathing the words against Nathan’s skin, remembering in starts and stops how much Nathan has to rely on everything but touch to get anything out of this. Clearing his throat, Duke groans.

“Might not be able to make you feel it, but you’ll know. You’ll know it when you look at me, right? Whenever you step foot on this boat, you’ll remember what I did to you,” and it’s the kind of dirty talk he never thought he’d be into, but if Nathan is into it, Duke’s going to at least try, and going by Nathan’s full-bodied shiver, Duke’s getting something right, for once.

Nathan’s face is a deeper red, now, his chest moving in big, unsteady breaths. His eyes squeeze shut, thighs clamping tighter around Duke’s hips, like a reflex, anchoring himself to Duke, gritting out a hoarse “What am I supposed to remember? You talking a big game?”

“Not enough for you?” Duke challenges, and he mouths at Nathan’s chest, at the jut of his collarbone, murmuring “You don’t want to hear all about how I’m going to make you come, Nate?”

“Duke,” Nathan mumbles, “Don’t,” but Duke can’t bring himself to stop. It’s almost impossible to make Nathan look at him, sometimes; having his undivided, reluctant attention makes Duke feel like he’s glowing brighter and hotter than a dying star, staring right back, meeting Nathan’s wild eyes.

“I don’t think so,” Duke gloats. “I’m going to fuck you and you’re going to know it tomorrow, right? Won’t be able to look at me without that little itch. I’m gonna know it too,” he adds. “I’m going to think about it whenever you come around to accuse me of things I didn’t do.”

He works a hand under Nathan’s jaw, tilting it back. Duke squeezes once, to see Nathan’s pulse jump, his eyes stormy when he looks back at Duke. “You wanna talk about it,” Nathan mutters, his voice gruff, “Or can we get down to it?”

He’s still hard in Duke’s hand. Angry and impatient, Nathan still waits for Duke to do something, worrying at his lower lip.

Duke has never wanted anyone more. He’s never been further away from someone, either, despite Nathan’s comfortable weight in his lap. Not answering, Duke leans in, his forehead to Nathan’s breastbone, hands splayed comfortably across Nathan’s ribs, feeling his steady breaths and the way his chest rises and then falls.

“Whatever you want,” Duke eventually says, offering Nathan a wry smile. “I do mean that. When you’re ready, you let me know.”

The bedside drawer opening sounds comically loud. Nathan startles in Duke’s lap, then calms, eyes flitting between the bottle in Duke’s hand and Duke’s flickering smile.

The light in Nathan’s eyes suddenly shifts, turning the flat blue into the sea in a storm, a flicker of annoyance and fear breaking through, like Duke’s not keeping pace, like he’s putting Nathan through something excruciating.

Nathan doesn’t say anything, though, only closing his eyes when Duke’s hands shift on his hips to bring him closer, urging Nathan higher on his knees, Duke taking the brunt of his weight while he works the half-full bottle of lube open, sliding slick fingers to the curve of Nathan’s ass a moment later.

It feels fucking momentous. Neil Armstrong walked on the moon; Duke is about to fuck Nathan Wuornos. It’s all relative.

If Nathan could feel it, if he could appreciate it, Duke would take it slow. It doesn’t matter one bit how gentle or rough he is, right now, but he takes care to wait for the give of Nathan’s body before he turns his wrist, gentling his fingers deeper, eyes transfixed on the place where his knuckles are sliding into Nathan, pink stretched around his knuckles. Duke almost forgets to breathe.

He startles when Nathan laughs, a tight and uncomfortable sound. “You know that’s weird,” he tells Duke. “Staring like that. At me. There.”

Nathan stutters the sentence out. Duke’s grin stretches a little wider. Despite everything that’s led them here, for a second, it almost feels like things are going to be alright after all.

Weird or not, it seems to be working for Nathan, his cock hard and curved and as flushed as his face, the soft, tight clutch of him around Duke’s fingers the last nail in the coffin. Nathan can’t argue his way out of this one. “Don’t tell me _that’s_ the dealbreaker,” Duke chuckles. “I can fuck you, but I can’t look at you?”

“Not like _that,”_ Nathan stresses, his mouth tight. “Like you, I don’t know, want a repeat performance or something.”

Nathan says it like it’s a bad thing, and Duke wonders if he should be grateful or annoyed that Nathan can’t tell that Duke’s always wanted more than this, but Nathan doesn’t have to know that, because this is just a means to an end for him.

In the end, Duke’s only response is a shrug, and he’s still looking, hearing Nathan’s sigh in the stillness of the room. He wonders, suddenly, if Nathan could take four fingers, five; wonders if he’d ever say yes, if Duke asked him to, shuddering all over at the idea, wild with desire, wild with the idea of taking Nathan to the edge and then past it. “I think you’re good. Here, let me…”

There’s some kind of apprehension in Nathan’s eyes when Duke maneuvers him into position and down, down, down, his body enveloping Duke in breathtaking heat, Duke’s hands so fucking clammy from holding back that he ends up losing his grip on Nathan’s waist, shaking against him, inside of him, the distinction getting a little fuzzy. All he can feel is Nathan, and Nathan can’t feel a thing.

Nathan makes an inquisitive sound, a sharp little noise that brings Duke back to himself, blinking and brushing his sweat-damp bangs out of his face to meet Nathan’s eyes, taking his face in his hands and groaning “You feel like a fucking dream. Look like one too, for the record,” which is so earnest, so hopelessly stupid, that Duke regrets it the moment he says it.

It coaxes a full-blown laugh from Nathan, though, which makes him shift, which makes Duke shift inside of him and lose his breath all over again.

Nathan’s eyes are restless, moving nervously between Duke’s face and Duke’s cock partway inside of him, shuddery exhales leaving him at the sight while he continues rising up hesitantly on his knees, still fixated on that particular visual. Duke runs a hand up Nathan’s spine, shivering.

“What does it feel like,” Nathan manages, looking back at Duke, “For you, if we did it the other way around?”

It must eat away at him, the not knowing.

“It feels,” Duke starts, trailing off to gather his thoughts, cradling Nathan’s hips and guiding him to rise and fall in a gentle, easy motion, starting them off slow. “Feels like pressure, at first. This...ache, deep inside of you. Makes you a little crazy.”

Nathan is nodding, his eyes falling closed, hands clenched roughly on Duke’s shoulders. He rocks his hips up, voice rough and stretched thin. “Feels like discovering something you never knew you could want. The way it fills you up like - god, Nate, like a promise, and...when your body welcomes it? That’s the best part. You want to stay in the moment, ‘cause it hurts in the right way. It makes you forget everything else. It’s amazing, Nathan.”

Maybe he’s talking about right, now, too. What Nathan doesn’t know won’t hurt him.

Duke’s voice trembles. He watches as Nathan hangs on his every word, his heart beating hard when Duke passes a hand across his chest. He knows Nathan would give anything to feel even a fraction of it, but for now, he makes do with the visual and Duke’s rough remembrance. 

Nathan curses, grinding down harder, Duke’s cock pushing deeper, and Duke talks through it all, his words getting thinner and more desperate. It’s half-sentences and strangled gasps; _it’s fucking beautiful, Nate. Feels like you’ll explode. Feels like the best thing you’ve never had._

He wouldn't go to the ends of the earth for Nathan, but in this moment, Duke would go pretty far for one more gasp, one last shudder up Nathan's spine. His head is spinning and Duke’s clutching at Nathan all over, looking for a handhold, wondering if Nathan would remember to breathe if Duke kissed him just then, if he slipped his tongue in Nathan’s mouth like a dirty secret.

“Duke,” Nathan moans, his face screwed up, hips twisting like he’s in pain, like he can’t decide where to go, “Duke, fuck,” and then Nathan makes the decision for him, kissing Duke harsh and firework-bright, breathing shallow against Duke’s mouth and then, suddenly, not breathing at all.

It reminds Duke of something, a memory that comes abrupt and unwelcome. Nathan’s clammy skin, still damp from the rain, the way he’s trembling without air, something about the mess of it all reminds Duke of the docks, years ago, when he was quickly approaching rock bottom and finally hit it with a flourish.

When Nathan looks up at him, wide-eyed and plainly terrified with desire, Duke can't keep the memory locked down anymore. He clings to Nathan, fucks him with a desperation that feels damning, the waves outside mocking Duke with every second that passes. Eight years ago, Duke had done the stupidest thing imaginable outside of this room.

Duke had been drunk. That had been the norm, so Duke had been drunk and bitter and barely vertical, stumbling his way down the beach, kicking out of his shoes, tossing a bottle of beer into the ocean and then, without thinking it through, he had followed the shiny Budweiser into the waves, like it was worth chasing.

A calm night like that, he hadn't seen the wave coming. It had bowled him over; pushed him down flat on his back in the shallows, eyes stinging from the salt, the denim of his jeans gone heavy against his thighs. Duke chokes out a breath against Nathan’s shoulder, like he can’t get enough air.

Underwater, he learned that things were different. The bottom of the ocean hadn't seemed so scary, back then, before Duke had gathered his bearings and realized how fine of a razor's edge he was walking - gulping saltwater, struggling against the tide, struggling against the urge to stop struggling entirely.

In the seconds before Duke had forced himself upright and above the surface of the water, he had felt calm. There's nothing like it, nothing that compares, not even here, with Nathan begging Duke to give him something.

Underwater, Duke had been calm. It's the closest he's ever been to death. The closest he's ever been to god, too.

That's how Nathan's body feels, right now, heavy in Duke’s arms; like a death sentence, a prayer, a sure thing. Duke exhales shaky and wet against Nathan's shoulder, wondering if Nathan feels his laughter before it comes bubbling out of Duke's throat, like it's inevitable. 

There's no stopping it once it starts. It’s helpless, ragged. It’s everything Duke can never scrub himself clean of.

"Duke," Nathan sighs, tentative in his own roundabout way, levering himself up high enough that Duke has to sit back on his haunches to accommodate Nathan's weight in his lap, shivering under Nathan's shaky palms against his cheeks. "What's there to laugh about, right now?" and he sounds awfully stern, like Duke’s a child caught doing something bad.

"Nothing," Duke admits, "Everything."

Nathan’s weight is comfortable. It should be, at least, but Duke's never been able to differentiate between a lifeline and an anchor. In the end, the weight's the same, no matter which angle you look at it from, and when Nathan rolls his eyes, Duke chokes out a quiet “Don’t,” that stops Nathan short of complaining, only gasping when Duke gathers him in his arms, mouthing hot and feverish at Nathan’s jaw.

A lightning bolt of sadness strikes Duke at the core, like one of those hollow trees that go up in flames after thunderstorms. Before Nathan can complain, Duke kisses him, lingering in it, whispering sweet nothings while Nathan moves on his cock, holding Duke like he’s not sure he’s doing it right and all the while, Duke clings to Nathan like he's a lifeline.

Truthfully, sometimes he is.

It's got to be the mother of all mood-killers, but Duke chokes out a sob against Nathan's shoulder without any real heat to it, because he's not crying, not really. It's a different kind of sadness, the kind that envelops him in waves. Grieving, maybe, for a life that was never Duke's, because he knows, deep down, that this is the first and last time he gets to have Nathan this way.

He can’t even be angry at Nathan, because Duke did this to himself. “Why does it have to be like this?” Duke wonders, palming Nathan’s hips, his vision going bright with stars.

Nathan's voice is a quiet thing. It rings loud in Duke's ears, anyways, because he says Duke’s name, urges him not to cry, and Duke wants to ask him if this is going to have been worth it, because Duke might’ve landed the first blow, caused the first crack, but Nathan’s the one taking a sledgehammer to the fragile pane of glass that is DukeandNathan, and Duke can’t do anything to stop him, because he said yes.

He let things spiral this far out of control because Duke is a coward with no self-control and he deserves Nathan punishing him like this, even if Nathan doesn’t know that’s what he’s doing.

"It's alright," Nathan tells him, which makes him a liar, because nothing has been alright since-

Since. It always comes back to the worst mistake of Duke’s life, where he wasn’t able to use his words, and everything has been different since then. There’s no undoing it, and he can tell Nathan’s thinking of it too when Duke laughs “No, it isn’t.”

Nathan's legs envelop Duke's hips, knobby knees bumping Duke's sides, all the warmth gone from his body. Duke wonders if Nathan has always been this skinny, this hollowed-out inside, because he looks like a stranger in Duke’s arms, like someone brand new that Duke can’t figure out.

He wonders if Nathan's always had these pale, flighty eyes, that thin mouth, those shoulder blades jutting out of his skin. He’s like a bird, Duke thinks to himself, dizzy with longing and dread. Nathan feels like a bird, sometimes, on the verge of taking flight and never coming home again.

"What's alright?" Duke pushes, laying Nathan down flat on his back, forcing his shoulders to land against the bed, "Me? Us? Try again, Nate,” and Duke’s getting mean, now, meaner than he wants to be, and still, still he tangles his fingers with Nathan’s, sends a prayer up to the big man, hoping Nathan won’t notice, their eyes meeting like a hammer striking the head of a nail.

All that bitterness makes a fire blaze in Nathan's eyes, but he still doesn't tell Duke to get off of him, to let Nathan up, because Duke’s figured it out - they’re both masochists. Neither of them know how to stop, and Nathan’s punishing himself as much as he’s punishing Duke.

"We're fine," Nathan snaps, then squeezes his eyes shut, barking out a laugh. His moan sounds angry, frustrated, when Duke fucks it out of him, hips trembling. "Why do you have to ruin everything?"

I don't know, Duke thinks. It suddenly feels sleazy, the shocking truth of what they're doing, of what Duke is doing to Nathan, because Nathan's trembling in his bed like he's got no idea he's doing it, and he doesn't. He can't, and the sad fucking truth of it all makes Duke want to cry.

Duke puts a palm to Nathan's cheek, instead, forcing himself to choke down the apology that tries to rise up in his throat like bile. What comes out in its place is a muted, faintly disgusted "You asked me for this, Nate. But you're gonna hate me when it's done, right? 'cause that's what you want. You want a good reason."

He should feel satisfied when Nathan flinches, cowering from the truth, but Duke doesn’t feel much of anything at all. He stills above Nathan, _in_ Nathan, breathing heavy breaths, hissing “Is this what you wanted, Nate? Is it?”

Nathan's eyes are bright and defiant when he looks right at Duke like he’s daring him to fight back, to start hitting below the belt. "I wanted you to fuck me," Nathan challenges, holding his breath in a weary anticipation.

"No," Duke sighs, "You wanted me to hurt you."

Right then, Duke can't see the distinction, anymore. He can't stomach another second of this, but he doesn’t move an inch, his entire body gone rigid with defeat.

“Why does it matter?” Nathan asks. He closes his eyes. It’s an invitation Duke never wanted. “You got what you wanted.”

He knows, because he’s always known, and Duke’s the idiot who thought - who hoped - that maybe, just maybe, Nathan wanted the same thing. “Why?” Duke repeats, his blood rushing in his ears, throat thick with something nasty, “Because-”

Nathan lies on Duke’s sheets, his eyes closed. When Duke cups Nathan’s cheek, Nathan can’t feel a second of it, wouldn’t want to anyway, because this isn’t anything more than an exercise in futility.

Duke stutters out something plaintive and ugly, the words sitting heavy on his tongue. “I love-” Duke manages, and then, when Nathan’s face falls, Duke doesn’t see the point in finishing.


End file.
